Author: Ophelia Benson

  • The right to the not possible

    On the NUJ statement on revised EHRC Equality Act Code of Practice part 2.

    The Code of Practice – which was submitted to the government in autumn of last year and has now been published – outlines how associations, businesses, and public-facing services should organise their facilities in accordance with the law. The EHRC has indicated that updated guidance addressing employers and workplaces will be published in due course.

    An earlier version of the EHRC guidance, published in response to that ruling, was met with widespread criticism, prompting the Commission to undertake further consultation before issuing this revised version.

    The NUJ reiterates its position that all workers, including trans and non-binary workers, have the right to safety, dignity and full participation. As the TUC states: “Dignity at work is not a limited resource. Women’s rights to safety, respect and equality are fundamental – and so are the rights of trans people.” Any members experiencing discrimination at work should contact the union for support.

    The TUC can state it until it’s blue in the face, but it will be wrong. “Dignity at work” fucking well is a limited resource if you take it away from women in order to give it to men. Women don’t have “dignity at work” if the men at work are allowed and encouraged to bounce into the women’s spaces whenever they like.

    I get so tired of pompous empty blather of that kind when it’s used to bully women into being doormats. How pathetic is it that it’s a union of journalists babbling this dreck?

  • Focus

    You’d think journalists could do better than this. A lot better.

    NUJ statement on revised EHRC Equality Act Code of Practice

    The NUJ has responded to the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s (EHRC) revised Code of Practice for businesses and service providers on how to comply with the Equality Act 2010.

    The updated code comes after significant public and legal debate following the UK Supreme Court ruling in April last year that the terms ‘woman’ and ‘sex’ under the Equality Act 2010 refer strictly to biological sex assigned at birth.

    Because wtf else would it refer to? Strictly or sloppily? If the word “woman” doesn’t refer strictly to women then we’ll just need a new word that does. The category itself is not one that we can simply throw out as otiose and harmful, now is it. Without the category there are no people. There are some words we could do without if we had to. The word “trans” might be a good place to start – or we could clean out all the synonyms. But there are other words that are just not dispensable, and there’s a strong argument that “women” is the very first item on that list. Without women, no people, no words, no lists – just grasses waving in the breeze.

    The word is important, therefore its meaning is important, therefore changing its meaning at the behest of damn fools like the one at the National Union of Journalists is a bad and misogynist thing to do.

  • He was overly hasty

    The…what to call it…not an apology…an admission, or correction.

    The “overly hasty expression of skepticism”:

    Is that an overly hasty expression of skepticism? Or is it something a little more intense, or harsh, or dismissive, or contemptuous than that?

    He says lesson learned, but I have to correct him there. He hasn’t learned a damn thing.

  • When in doubt, do the dangerous thing

    The BBC:

    Dozens of children questioning their gender, including some under 13 years old, were inappropriately prescribed medication by a Brighton GP practice, an NHS safety investigation has found.

    A year-long inquiry into the WellBN clinic found that 78 young patients were potentially harmed after puberty-blocking drugs and cross-sex hormones were prescribed without proper checks.

    More than 20 children were given medication without a face-to-face appointment between February 2023 and December 2025.

    Brighton. It would be Brighton.

    Dr Christopher Tibbs, regional medical director for NHS England, said that young people were put at a high risk of harm because clinicians provided “specialist diagnosis, care and treatment that they were neither qualified, nor commissioned to deliver”.

    “Under no circumstances should this have happened,” he added.

    Not even the circumstance of being in Brighton, where trans ideology is all but mandatory?

    The investigation, run by five independent clinicians appointed by NHS Sussex, began in June 2025 after several families had complained about the services the clinic was offering to under 18s, and after a civil legal case had started against the clinic and the NHS.

    One father told the BBC that his 16-year-old child was given hormones without his knowledge in what he describes as a “medical scandal” while another said the stress of the situation had left him suicidal.

    The final report said that 78 children under 18 years old were prescribed gender medication by the clinic from 2023 to late 2025.

    Some were given drugs designed to delay or suppress puberty, while others were given cross-sex hormones, also known as masculinising and feminising hormones.

    I wonder if it ever crossed anyone’s mind that maybe, it being Brighton and all, the children weren’t so much stricken with gender anguish as they were soaked in gender ideology because it was Brighton.

    The report found that:

    • Overall the approach to care fell “far short of what could be considered safe or appropriate”
    • None of the clinicians investigated were professionally competent to start children on gender medications
    • There was an “absence of advice or support” from doctors who specialise in hormones or the treatment of children questioning their gender
    • Necessary blood tests were often not carried out, putting children’s physical health at risk
    • The overall risk to young patients was potentially high, although actual harm was hard to quantify partly because of poor record keeping

    Pretty damn stunning, wouldn’t you say? Trends are one thing, and messing up teenagers for life is quite another.

    Rachel Cashman, who co-founded PSHE Brighton, says the stress of the situation had “ruptured” families, leaving some parents estranged from their children.

    “It’s not just the medical damage, but the collateral damage for relationships and families that is far greater than people have ever really thought to examine,” she adds.

    Cashman says some of the children prescribed hormone treatments had also been diagnosed with conditions such as autism and ADHD, and the focus on gender medication risked overshadowing their wider health needs.

    The report found that 53 of the 78 cases reviewed had possible neuro-developmental issues.

    Jeezus christ. Primum non nocere eh? Whatever happened to that?

  • Just stop

    Oh honestly. Putting the substance aside for the moment, this sentimental slush has never been relentlessly deployed this way for any other subordinated group. No, trans people en masse don’t “deserve” love – nobody does. It’s not true and it’s extremely ick. It’s a dopy change of subject. Campaigning for equal rights is not the same thing as campaigning for love and cuddles and a teddy bear.

    If you think about it for one second it becomes obvious – a campaign for human rights can’t afford to attach it to a demand for universal love, because universal love of huge populations is a demand that’s impossible to meet. If the human rights depend on love then they become unobtainable. Rights have nothing to do with love. They are independent of love. They have to be, because they have to apply across the board, without regard to how we feel about the niceness or otherwise of the people at issue. Prisoners have rights. Murderers have rights. Love is not the issue.

  • Yes yes women BUT TRANS MORE

    Oh well it’s only journalism, what difference can it make?

    The National Union of Journalists tells us:

    The NUJ has responded to the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s (EHRC) revised Code of Practice for businesses and service providers on how to comply with the Equality Act 2010.

    The updated code comes after significant public and legal debate following the UK Supreme Court ruling in April last year that the terms ‘woman’ and ‘sex’ under the Equality Act 2010 refer strictly to biological sex assigned at birth.

    https://x.com/JournalismSEEN/status/2065009762094178427

    As opposed to…what? The far more obvious and longstanding and truth-noticing reference to magical in the head sex assigned well after birth?

    To spell it out more obviously, why is a union of journalists telling us that what sex people are is a vague, difficult, tricky matter of opinion that is up for debate? Of fucking course the words “woman” and “sex” refer to woman and sex.

    The NUJ reiterates its position that all workers, including trans and non-binary workers, have the right to safety, dignity and full participation. As the TUC states: “Dignity at work is not a limited resource. Women’s rights to safety, respect and equality are fundamental – and so are the rights of trans people.” Any members experiencing discrimination at work should contact the union for support.

    How sweet, but I can’t help noticing one tiny flaw. They don’t spell out what these “rights of trans people” are.

    This is how the con game keeps working. Just talk grandiose but empty guff about rights without ever spelling out what rights you mean and there you are, winning all the prizes. There are women, continuing to struggle to keep our own rights as we’ve been doing for the last ten years or more.

    The NUJ also stresses that the media, like all members of society, has a responsibility to treat transgender people with fairness, integrity and respect. The NUJ encourages members and the wider media to follow the union’s code of conduct and LGBT+ reporting guidelines. 

    The NUJ continues to monitor developments, including how guidance may impact inclusion and workplace practices, and reaffirms its commitment to advocating equality for all workers.

    The end. Women’s rights don’t make it into the discussion apart from that one reference that is instantly canceled by the shout of “BUT TRANS RIGHTS TOO!!”

  • Guest post: Disability Rights UK opposes the law of the land

    Our friend latsot posted a brief essay on twitx that deserves wider sharing. Here it is.

    Disability Rights UK opposes the law of the land, specifically the Equality Act 2010.

    It also opposes the disabled people it purports to represent.

    It places a far, far greater priority on the wishes and feelings of men who say they are women than on the needs of disabled people.

    In all its talk of healthcare and the lamenting of gender-addled people being placed on wards relating to their sex, it does not once mention the necessity of single-sex intimate care for disabled women.

    It does not say that disabled women should be allowed to choose the sex of the person carrying out their intimate care, which most often takes place in the woman’s own home, far from supervision.

    It sees this as a far lesser priority than men being allowed to invade female wards, where they are known to be a danger.

    Could there possibly be more of an indication that Disability Rights UK has entirely lost its way and is no longer a disability rights charity at all?

    The charity’s statement does say one thing that initially seems to support disabled people: “We are appalled at implications from the Code that an adequate workaround is trans people using Disabled toilets instead.”

    I fully agree. However, it goes on to explain that its concern is not about disabled people who will lose our accessible facilities altogether if anyone and everyone is permitted to use them, but for the men who will be sad if they can’t invade women’s spaces.

    Not “accessible spaces are under threat of colonisation by the able-bodied”, but “we will not be used as a ‘loophole’ in the wider erosion of trans rights.”

    That is exactly the wrong way around.

    Disabled people have known for a decade that the major disability charities are hopelessly captured. They’re pulling a Stonewall by going after easy money and cheap non-solutions to the problems disabled people face every day. They’re throwing us under the same bus Stonewall threw same-sex attracted people under.

    We’ve known this and we’ve tried to fight it but we haven’t been heard.

    The gender war against disabled people is about to intensify and we don’t have many allies.

    Can I ask you to share this, to demand answers from the major disability charities if you can and to remember that gender ideology is not just a war on women, children and same-sex attracted people, it’s a war on disabled people too.

    And we often feel as though we’re fighting it on our own.

    Disability Rights UK statement.

  • Very active activists

    Theeeeeeeeee most persecuted oppressed bullied tormented set of people ever.

    Threats from transgender activists have forced the equalities watchdog to move offices, its chair has revealed.

    Dr Mary-Ann Stephenson said that the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) had been forced to relocate after its headquarters was targeted by a group previously linked to attacks on a women’s conference and MPs’ offices.

    Oh yes that group. Bash Back.

    Appearing before MPs on the women and equalities select committee on Tuesday, Stephenson said that staff safety was a concern amid the controversy over the Supreme Court’s ruling on the definition of sex under the Equality Act.

    Staff safety is a concern because men are not women.

    Rosie Duffield, the former Labour MP who now sits as an independent, asked whether EHRC employees felt safe after protests against the regulator’s work.

    Stephenson said: “We have had to move from our premises near Vauxhall [in south London] to other premises because of an attack on the building, vandalism, by a group that had also vandalised conferences and Wes Streeting’s office.

    “I hope that where we are now we are in a safe position, but it is something that I’m very conscious of, particularly in terms of the safety of the staff.”

    The group is understood to be Bash Back, the activist network that has previously claimed responsibility for vandalising events attended by campaigners supporting single-sex spaces and the implementation of the Supreme Court judgment.

    The “activist network” that deploys violence and threats to silence women defending their rights.

  • Booed louder than the San Antonio Spurs

    So Trump ruined the game for fans. That will do wonders for his popularity!

    In the middle of the national anthem, moments before the first NBA Finals game at Madison Square Garden in 27 years, President Donald J. Trump stood at attention in his suite, surrounded by bulletproof glass, and was roundly booed by his fellow New Yorkers as he was shown on the overhanging video board.

    The first sitting U.S. president to attend a finals game, Trump, 79, of New York, was booed louder than the San Antonio Spurs. He was shown long enough for the fans lustily booing him to see him smirk.

    Attaboy. Ruin people’s day and then smirk.

    And then the Knicks dropped Game 3, 115-111. It was their first playoff loss since April 23 and snapped a historic 13-game winning streak. It just didn’t go well for anyone rooting for New York, from Penn Station to Pennsylvania Ave.

    The massive amount of extra security needed for a president to sit indoors with 20,000 hoops fans became an inconvenience for the city and a defining storyline going into the game — with extraordinarily long lines to get in, the no-bag policy and canceled watch parties outside of the Garden.

    …

    Police and Secret Service agents set up a wide security perimeter around the Garden starting at 4 p.m. No one without a ticket or work credentials could get through the fences restricting access, and then they were made to stand in long, airport security-like lines to get into the arena. Fans were prohibited from bringing bags, and Spurs guard De’Aaron Fox said players were asked to limit what they brought into the arena and were searched by Secret Service agents upon entering the arena.

    Footage of 7-foot-4 French star Victor Wembanyama being screened in a pair of shorts after getting off the Spurs bus made waves on social media.

    A free Knicks watch party for fans without tickets was relocated from outside the Garden to Bryant Park, where there were reports of fights and police in riot gear near the end of the game. Numerous videos taken from the park showed fans booing Trump as he appeared on projector screens. Some bars inside the security perimeter were boarded up for the evening.

    “I think the president being here makes it inconvenient on everybody else,” Fox said. “We have more security, we had to send stuff early, I think our buses are getting there a little early.”

    Whatever. Inconvenience to thousands of people is nothing compared to Trump’s evening out.

    On the U.S. Senate floor in Washington on Monday, Charles Schumer, Democrat from New York, said, “Tonight ought to be all about the game, the players and the fans. But Donald Trump wants to make tonight about himself, like he always does.

    “Midtown has to shut down. Bars near the Garden are about to take a huge hit on what should be their biggest night of the year. And free watch parties near the Garden have been canceled because Trump can’t bear letting anyone else be the center of attention for one night.”

    It’s true you know. All the upheaval and cancelation and fuss is not a downside for Trump, it’s a key part of the fun. Thousands of people pushed around and disappointed, and one greedy selfish man happy. Life as it should be.

  • Until the science answers the question

    MP John-Paul Danko thinks asking “What is a woman?” is highly offensive.

    To be fair, twenty or thirty years ago I would have thought the same thing, because it could only have been some kind of sarcastic response to a feminist analysis or interpretation or demand or agenda. This is not that.

  • Man who asked

    Outrageous BBC headline of the week, or year.

    Grabbing a woman’s hair and leaning on her is not “asking her for a kiss”. What tf is wrong with the people at the Beeb? Are they recruited from the mysterious Institute for Misogynist Shits?

  • Green hair and undershirt

    The headline says:

    Oxford ‘allowed’ trans protest that cancelled lecture series

    But the subhead gets it right:

    Activists disrupted two lectures on gender in the law by the equality law expert Dr Michael Foran

    They didn’t “protest”; they shut down. The two are not the same. Let’s not err on the side of validating the little shits, eh?

    Dr Michael Foran, 32, an associate professor of law, confirmed on Sunday that he had cancelled talks on how sex and gender had affected the law in relation to controversies over single-sex spaces, freedom of expression, privacy, sport and sexual intimacy.

    Footage posted online shows how trans activists interrupted two talks Foran gave on this topic. The videos capture the activists — understood to be students at the university — standing in front of his lectern and telling the audience he was bigoted, urging them not to give him a platform.

    One of them with green hair and wearing a bathing suit. Not literally a bathing suit but a minimal undershirt and shorts. I’m a tad 19th century that way, I don’t want to see acres of other people’s skin unless we’re all at the beach.

    In a recording of a lecture on May 29, taken by an audience member, one of the protesters claimed that Foran “masks his transphobia behind a thin veneer of academia”.

    The protester added: “If you are here in a critical capacity to challenge his ideas … that is not the same as refusing to platform him. He will not be convinced by your arguments. Please join me in walking out and refusing to platform this bigot.”

    Because he will be convinced by that? I suspect a flaw in the chain of reasoning there.

    In a video of the second lecture on June 5, the same two protesters could again be seen addressing the audience at the start of the event. However, on this occasion their voices were largely drowned out by objections to their presence from those attending.

    But they got their way anyway. Why’s that?

    A university source who was present at the lectures but has asked to remain anonymous has revealed that the university proctors’ office gave permission for the protests to go ahead.

    The students who attended also confirmed that, although they had made complaints to the proctors about the disruptive and intimidating nature of the demonstration at Foran’s first talk, the officials allowed the activists to protest at a second lecture.

    Why? Why, why, why? Why are we all hostages to the enforcers of this idiotic ideology? Why can’t these two young shits be disciplined instead of encouraged to continue?

    It is the job of the proctors’ office to enforce “conduct regulations” at Oxford and as such students must seek permission from their office to stage a protest on the provision that it is peaceful and does not disrupt “the lawful exercise of freedom of speech”.

    The university source who witnessed the protests told The Times: “This was not a non-disruptive protest. It broke the university rules because it is a disciplinary matter to seek to deplatform or attempt to disrupt events, which is what the activists were doing.”

    So why were they told to go ahead? Is there a mole in the proctors’ office?

    A spokeswoman for Oxford said that freedom of speech and academic freedom were fundamental to the university and that they remained committed to these principles. She said: “Members of our academic community must be able to teach, research, speak and debate within the law, including on issues that are controversial or strongly contested. Equally, we support the right to lawful protest and civil disagreement.”

    Well guess what: you can’t do both. If you give students permission to disrupt lectures then you’re not allowing the members of your academic community to teach, research, speak and debate within the law, including on issues that are controversial or strongly contested. You’re doing the opposite of that. You’re allowing teenagers in nasty undershirts to prevent that.

  • There there

    Heh.

    I don’t know who the artist is Barry Blitt.

  • Any fule kno

    Ah. Well. If they know instinctively, that settles it.

    We don’t have evidence, but we know instinctively, and that instinct is in no way connected to our political affiliations or our choice of outcome. You can take that to the bank.

  • By protesters

    When in doubt, cancel.

    An Oxford University professor has been forced to cancel lectures following abuse from pro-trans activists.

    Dr Michael Foran, 32, an associate professor of law at the university, was interrupted by protesters at two separate talks discussing gender law in recent weeks.

    Footage obtained by The Telegraph showed activists standing in front of his lectern and telling the audience he was a “bigot” and “transphobic”.

    It’s not “bigotry” to know that sex is not swappable. It’s not phobic to know that men can’t be women.

    The academic, who is an expert on gender law, confirmed on Sunday that he had cancelled his remaining two lectures because of the “escalating disruptive protests”.

    “This is deeply lamentable, but the disruption has undermined the academic nature of this series,” he said in a post on X. “Students shouldn’t face bullying or harassment when attending academic events.”

    And that’s so especially true when the bullying comes from people who are factually wrong and also morally wrong.

    I mean, I’ll be honest and admit that if an academic were doing talks on why we should genocide all the [insert despised group here] I would think such talks should be canceled. Genocides do in fact start with incitement, and they do happen, and that’s why I’m not an absolutist about free speech.

    But this obviously is not that.

    At his first lecture on May 29, as he stood at the lectern preparing to begin, two activists walked to the front of the lecture hall and started addressing the audience. They are both believed to be students at the university.

    In a video taken by an audience member, one of them, reading from his phone, claimed that Dr Foran “masks his transphobia behind a thin veneer of academia”. He added: “If you are here in a critical capacity to challenge his ideas… that is not the same as refusing to platform him. He will not be convinced by your arguments. Please join me in walking out and refusing to platform this bigot.”

    Audience members could be heard urging the protesters to leave, while Dr Foran said: “I’d really appreciate if you don’t disrupt this event.”

    At the next lecture on June 5, the same two protesters again addressed the audience at the start of the lecture. In the footage, their voices can hardly be heard as audience members shouted at them to leave and drowned them out with chanting.

    And, oddly enough, that’s not how Michael Foran wants to give his lectures.

    Kate Barker, the chief executive of LGB Alliance, said: “We’re saddened that the people of Oxford have been deprived of Michael’s expertise, especially at a time when clarity and expertise on the law is so sorely needed. “

    She added: “We would urge these intolerant activists to apply a little critical thinking, and engage with people and arguments, even when they feel uncomfortable.”

    Or failing that, at least sit still and shut tf up.

  • Which twin is the silliest?

    Good old 5 Pillars.

    The full image:

    Right. A woman who wears the full burqa is of course going to be hanging out with that nice lesbian next door and going to a party with all the nice everybody welcome here people the nice lesbian next door is friends with. They have everything in common, they just happen to have different tastes in fashion.

  • A constitutional framework

    United Humanists on Facebook:

    The U.S. Supreme Court upheld West Virginia’s Save Women’s Sports Act — a law banning transgender girls and women from competing in female sports categories in public schools and universities. The 6-3 ruling found that biological sex could be used as the basis for sports categorisation without violating the Equal Protection Clause. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, in a forceful dissent joined by Justices Sotomayor and Kagan, wrote that the majority had endorsed a constitutional framework that treats trans women as categorically different from other women — not on the basis of athletic performance data, but on identity alone.

    Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…yes? Because they are? Categorically different is exactly what they are? Thank you for putting it so clearly. Too bad you don’t understand your own words.

    Of course trans women are categorically different from women, on account of how trans women are men. You can’t be a trans woman without being a man. And yes of course on the basis of identity alone, because that’s what the claim is – a delusional or manipulative claim to have the identity of a woman despite in fact being a man.

    The ruling creates a constitutional framework in which states may distinguish between trans and non-trans women in contexts where the distinction can be framed as serving a governmental interest.

    Well thank fucking fuck for that. States need to distinguish between trans women and women, and we all need states to do so. The fact that men who claim to be women don’t like it is just too god damn bad. Stand up for women why don’t you.

  • One could apply your trenchant analysis

    Ok, frivolous but hilarious so I’m gonna be frivolous.

    Hugh Laurie gets diagnosis wrong again. Gets threatened with being fired. Patient nearly dies again.

    Hugh Laurie has last minute leftfield idea. Gets diagnosis right. Doesn’t get fired.

    Eight seasons of this?

  • How to celebrate the anniv

    Will a lawsuit save the day?

    A federal lawsuit seeks to halt the upcoming UFC fight card on the White House South Lawn in a mixed martial arts show timed for President Donald Trump’s 80th birthday and part of the celebration of the nation’s 250th anniversary.

    The filing Saturday by the Public Integrity Project on behalf of two Virginia residents contends the Trump administration’s authorization of the June 14 event was unlawful. The lawsuit says such approval violated National Park Service regulations prohibiting sporting events on federal parklands, Congress did not consent to the towering arch overlooking the event space and no environmental review was conducted before the construction.

    Other than that, Mr Lincoln, how did you like the play?

    Crews are erecting an octagon-shaped cage on the South Lawn. Trump has said the finished UFC project will feature “a 5,000-seat arena right outside the front door of the White House.” 

    And that’s a problem.

    H/t Josh Larios

  • Only the best

    Talk about a revolving door…

    A couple of weeks ago, the public learned about a Jan. 6 rioter who was arrested on a gun charge in Texas more than a year after receiving a presidential pardon from Donald Trump. Just days earlier, law enforcement officials in Florida announced a prostitution, human trafficking and child predator sting, which led to the arrest of two more Jan. 6 participants who had also received pardons from the incumbent president.

    Two weeks before that, a pardoned Jan. 6 rioter reached a plea agreement with prosecutors over charges of sexual exploitation of a minor and possessing sexually explicit images of children. Those developments come three weeks after a different Jan. 6 rioter who received a presidential pardon was sentenced to four years in prison on child pornography charges. Earlier in the month, a different Jan. 6 rioter, who was also rescued by Trump, was sentenced to life in prison for molesting two children.

    Well at least they’re victimless crimes…

    It’s hard not to wonder: Just how many pardoned Jan. 6 rioters have run into fresh trouble with the law after receiving clemency from Trump? As it turns out, an answer has come into focus: Lawfare, a nonprofit legal issues publication, published a study this week that found at least 97 people who were charged with crimes in connection with the assault on the Capitol and who have been accused of new crimes. The New York Times noted that the total is “larger than previously known.”

    Jeezus.

    On the upside, some of them were hired by the Trump regime before they got around to committing new crimes.

    Last summer, for example, Trump’s Justice Department hired Jared Wise, a former FBI agent who participated in the Jan. 6 riot and was filmed urging his fellow insurrectionists to “kill” police officers. This week, The Washington Post also reported on a rioter named Elias Irizarry, who pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge and was sentenced to 14 days in jail in 2023 and who was recently hired for a sensitive counterterrorism job in a Pentagon office “that manages highly classified military operations.”

    Seems like a wise move.

    That said, the Pentagon again made no effort to deny the accuracy of the reporting, and a spokesperson for the department described Irizarry as “a qualified, patriotic young professional,” adding that the Defense Department is “proud to have him as a political appointee.”

    The Pentagon’s pride notwithstanding, the Post’s report noted the position that Irizarry now holds requires a top-secret security clearance, and he’s part of a team that handles some of “the most delicate” work the Pentagon performs.

    The timing of these developments could have been better: When Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth once again intervened this week in a military branch’s promotion list, disproportionately targeting women and minority officers, a Pentagon spokesperson said personnel decisions are entirely “merit based.”

    Mm. Get the women and brown people out, replace them with convicted felons. Yay progress.